


#45 Ownership of such fragile devices

by midnightflame



Category: Naruto
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-13
Updated: 2016-08-13
Packaged: 2018-08-08 11:05:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7755244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightflame/pseuds/midnightflame
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The past has a way of keeping hold even as we push forward</p>
            </blockquote>





	#45 Ownership of such fragile devices

**Author's Note:**

> It's been such a long time since I've touched any fic related stuff, but I really wanted to write Sasuke struggling with himself and despite that finding hope.

They always came at night. 

Not every night, not every week, but when they came it was always well after the sun had settled into the nest of the horizon. Some nights, he was still wide awake; others, he had already settled into sleep. Sasuke had found, though, that as he had gotten older, they seemed to visit with less frequency. He wasn't entirely sure it was due to Time's influence, but he didn't really want to lay credit down before anyone else's feet either. Or rather, a particular someone's feet. Responsibility was tricky like that, and while he had spent a good majority of his twenty-one years trying to place it along with blame on everyone else but himself, the idea that this particular relief could be the work of someone else grated him in some very awkward ways. If he opened himself up to the possibility, then maybe it meant he was ready for something more than forgiveness. 

Sasuke didn't know if he was at that point yet. But if you asked the dreams that twisted his reality at night, they would tell him he still had no right to it. 

Not just yet. Not after everything he had done.

It was that foreboding sense of _not enough_ that drove him still. A far cry from the variety that had needled his pride ten years ago. This one didn't come to him in his brother's voice, cold and certain and everything Itachi had wanted Sasuke to believe all for the sake of a life better lived. He had failed miserably on that part. Itachi had acknowledged that much. Two years after saying farewell to his brother yet again, Sasuke was finally able to admit it too - he had fucked up this whole living thing rather royally. 

Despite that though, Itachi had loved him. In spite of it all, Naruto still fought to stand by his side. 

Sasuke breathed out heavily, ran a hand down his face. At some point during the night he had fallen asleep, seated against a cracked stone pillar and blanketed by the cool of shadow. Not that it stopped the sweat from gathering along his brow, spilling down the back of his neck with slow precision. He could feel every drop as it rolled over skin only to sink into his shirt, the edges of his ANBU vest. He squeezed his eyes shut, bringing his fingers to them once more to press against his eyelids. No matter what he did, the visions remained. 

Sometimes, Itachi came to him as he had last seen him, a flurry of light, body dissipating as the only thing keeping him grounded to this world released itself from the souls it had anchored. Those moments were blinding. Sasuke never knew quite what he felt when his brother stood before him, unmade. But, it set an ache to his heart that made him wonder just how much more he had to go before there was some sort of right in his existence. How many more missions, how closely he would have to keep to the line before he was no longer Konoha's prodigal son and simply another nin working for the world they had all fought to keep. Ached because he wondered if Itachi would approve because try as he would with that line, he could never quite keep himself on the better part of it. Honestly, if not for Naruto constantly tugging him out of the shadows, Sasuke was certain they would swallow him whole. Not that it was a bad thing - he wasn't that far gone anymore. Only, it made trying to keep a positive light on his name an infinitely more difficult task, like trying to paint a tiger's stripes orange only to have the black bleed right back through. 

He wasn't meant for the light. He just knew he was better than the dark. 

His lips parted, releasing a tightly wound huff. Setting his head back against the stone, Sasuke opened his eyes and fixed his gaze on the moon. Full and bright and beautiful. 

"You didn't have to take this mission, Sasuke."

The left corner of his mouth twisted, his smirk undaunted. "And you didn't have to come trailing after me."

He could just make the outline of Naruto's form as it stood some twenty feet from him. The moonlight tangled in his hair, turning the blond strands silver. Sasuke breathed out again, willing the afterimages of his dreams out of his mind's eye. Tonight, they hadn't been quite as kind as those last visions he remembered of his brother. 

"Besides, if I couldn't tackle this then what else would they ask of me?"

Naruto held silent, but Sasuke could just imagine the look on his face: lips pursed with troubled thought, blue eyes bright with defiance despite it. Without realizing it, Sasuke began to laugh. 

It was a real fucking circus of diplomatic bullshit if you asked him. The only way to succeed was to take on the risk of ruining yourself, of proving to the world that you could be everything they had thought you to be - a danger to the peace burned so brilliantly into their minds by war. Instead of staying with the village afterwards, he had left to put his life back in order. And Sasuke imagined they had let him, in part, to see just what sort of answers he would find. When he had come back, ready to take his place in Konoha once more, he was sent to ANBU. Not simply because of his talents, his lack of aversion to the darker dealings of the ninja world (and they still existed no matter what anyone said for the public cause), but because it gave Konoha the greatest ability to monitor his every action. Naruto had argued against it, futilely. Sasuke had accepted it because he understood the consequences of starting another battle.

And now, here he was. In a place all too familiar, haunted by dreams and too exhausted to escape them at the moment. 

Naruto was picking his way over to him now, stepping easily around fallen bits of rubble, hopping over the few cracks marring the stone. Sasuke blinked. Seconds later, Itachi was reaching out for him, bloodied and bruised with the stumbling gait of a man already seeing Death. His heart fluttered as fear bubbled up in his throat. The laughter turned hoarse. 

When he blinked again, Naruto was kneeling before him. Sasuke could feel his gaze cutting into him, as it always seemed to do, exposing all the rawest bits of himself. As only Naruto had ever been able to do with him, because only Naruto had ever really understood. It set a different ache upon his heart. 

"The mission is over. Why are you here, Naruto?"

Sasuke flinched as Naruto reached out and touched the small laceration over his eye. Maybe that was why he had been seeing Itachi in red. A smile cracked his lips. Naruto's mouth formed a frown in response. 

"Because I knew you would be here, and I need to make damn sure you're coming back from here."

At the periphery, Sasuke could make out a shadow, wavering like water touched by a gust. Indistinct and fluttering. He shut his eyes again before the figure could burst apart with an explosion of caws. That was what it always did - just before he could make it out, _poof!_. Reminding him of how poor a handle he could really have on the world. 

"Do you think this would stop me?" Sasuke asked, voice heavy, too tired for the emotions pounding on his heart. "I just. . ."

"Sasuke. . ." Hesitancy threaded through Naruto's tone. Sasuke fixed his gaze on the blue of Naruto's eyes. ". . .who do you see right now?"

And just like that Sasuke was closing his eyes, trying not to laugh all over again. Not because this was funny. Not because he wasn't lucid. Simply because, one more sound and he knew his voice would break. Just like that, a shattering of sound. Naruto was reaching out, pulling Sasuke forward into an embrace as he fell back against the stone. And Sasuke let him, doing nothing as they lay sprawled against the ground. Naruto's heart was loud, even under his jounin's vest, his pulse strong and synchronous. So very much alive. 

He exhaled, softly, the smell of blood and fire slipping away from his senses, replaced by the scents of sweat and sunlight. "I see you. . .just you, moron."


End file.
